Living implies solving (or, at least, trying to solve) a series of everyday problems that never cease, of greater or lesser entity depending on the circumstances, luck and personality of each person.

Most problems can be solved in a routine way , imitating the solutions that have been instilled in us or that we see applied by the society around us, or in a different and personal way, looking for originality, trying to find a better alternative.

Creativity: searching for better solutions

All problems, by definition, have at least one solution; for if a situation lacks a solution, it ceases to be a problem and becomes a tragedy, misfortune or bad fortune. Some mathematical problems (pure and exact sciences) present unique solutions; some mental or philosophical problems present two opposing solutions (they are the “to be or not to be” type dilemmas, for example).

But
the most common problems of human life (impure sciences and practical philosophy) present a variety of options to face them , although not all of them are easy to see if the look with which we approach them is not accompanied by the creative spirit.

Learn more:
“What is creativity? Are we all ‘potential geniuses’?”

The routines of creative people

Does this mean that we should reject by all means the routines that life offers us? Far from it.
Routines have an unfair bad reputation . It means, only, that in front of every routine solution we should question ourselves if we are able to optimize it or to find a better routine, based on other methods and other concepts.

The great progress made by humanity has consisted and will continue to consist precisely in
to convert into efficient routines the solutions that until then were unable to be solved systematically or that involved inefficient routines. Converting an appendicitis or cesarean section operation into a simple surgical routine was a great step forward. Changing the routine of going to the river to do the laundry for the domestic washing machines, being able to talk on the phone with any inhabitant of the planet at the touch of a finger, have become the lucky routines of our time. Millions of successful routine solutions make up our current well-being.

Routines that improve our well-being

As the great philosopher and mathematician said
Alfred North Whitehead : “Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations that can be performed without having to think about how to do them”. To create a routine to solve a problem where there was none is one of the greatest possible greatness of creativity: antibiotics to cure infections; the internet to expand knowledge, are paradigmatic examples.

Preventing Alzheimer’s, defeating cancer, avoiding the huge economic inequalities or reversing climate change are four of the many outstanding challenges we face today.

Tips to be more creative

The first step of the creative is to detect a problem where the rest of humanity does not see it or does not dare to face it. Without making the mistake of confusing creative nonconformity with systematic discontent, the rebel without a cause, the inoperative whiner.
The second step is to conveniently define and limit the scope and extent of the problem . The third is to look for solutions that exist in other countries or environments different from our usual one. The Internet and its search engines are, at this point, of invaluable help.

If we find what we’re looking for, we’ll replace the routine of our peers with that learned on the net. We will be innovative and we may have a following and create a trend. If not, we will enter the fourth stage of the process: creative reflection, the active search for alternatives. It is the phase in which we will have to resort to our right hemisphere, our intuition, our unconscious, our sensory stimuli, our dreams, our open and uninhibited mental associations. And it is at this point that the texts that teach us to trust our sensory stimuli, to avoid creative blockages of any kind and to employ mental strategies, techniques and methods to help produce the indispensable inspiration are useful for our brain. Much has happened since
Alex F. Osborn invented in 1957 his famous “brainstorming” and great have been the contributions of many authors in the aids to creativity.

Creative or visionary?

Being creative is not about seeing what no one else has seen or doing what no one else was capable of doing (these would be, in any case, two superhero comic book superpowers).
To be creative is “to think what nobody has thought, to associate elements that nobody has associated before” .

All the great steps of progress have been born of an imaginative mind that has associated with freedom things that until then no one had dared to put together. Being creative is not about seeing what no one has seen before or having a magic power to transform ideas into reality. Being creative consists of seeing the same thing that everyone else sees, but thinking things about it that no one else has ever thought about before, making a new association brought about by the imagination. With the help of the right mental strategies.

You may be interested in: “The 14 keys to boosting creativity”

Slow but persistent progress

Everyone knew since prehistoric times that an empty trunk could sail like a walnut shell; and they would break their arms rowing to move it. Everyone had observed that the wind can push the leaf of a plant and carry it great distances. But
It took centuries before someone imagined a leaf tied to the shell of a walnut with a vertical stick . It is quite possible that 3,500 years ago it was an Egyptian child who said to his parents: “I want to test whether the wind that blows a palm leaf can push a shell over the Nile”, and his parents would say: “What a nice idea! We’ll help you test it.”

The invention of sailing was the main technology of maritime transport until the invention of steam in the late 19th century. All the great world empires relied on it to trade and impose their military rule. But it was humanly impossible for the Egyptian child we have imagined to foresee the true dimension of his creation. For – we must not doubt it – also in our time,
a child could open the key to the mental concept we need for our technological progress from the evolved objects around us.

Changing the paradigm

We should be perceptive, attentive to the creativity of our most preclassified minds: children and good creatives . The blackness and immensity of the unresolved or poorly resolved problems that lie ahead of us forces us to resort to them, without a doubt.

If we are allowed a play on words: We must acquire the routine of looking at all the problems that involve us in a creative way. To build the routines that solve us in a systematic and stable way, the problems of humanity that we are not solving in the right way.

Bibliographic references:

  • Demory, B. Creativity Techniques. Granica, 1997.
  • Guilera, L. Anatomy of creativity. FUNDIT- ESDi, 2011.
  • Siqueira, J.Applied Creativity: Tools, techniques and key attitudes to be more creative. CreateSpace, 2013